“So,” Vestibule murmured, getting my attention. “What do you think?”
“I think you must have misunderstood,” I answered. “Between the movie premiere and tonight, I don’t think your cousin’s said ten words to me.”
“She’s shy.”
“No, she isn’t,” I countered, essentially verbalizing what I’d picked up on empathically.
Vestibule simply laughed. “Okay, so she isn’t shy. However, I was telling the truth when I said she thinks you’re cute, but she was operating under the impression that there was something between us. I told her that it was open season on you – that you and I are just friends.” Then she gave me an inquisitive look before adding, “Or did I misstate the facts?”
Her question struck me as peculiar, but I pushed it aside in order to focus on the statement that she’d made about it being open season on me. Frankly speaking, I’d had a girlfriend until very recently, and we’d actually had a very good relationship. However, things had gotten rather complicated when – after a visit to my alien grandmother’s home planet of Caeles – I’d returned to Earth with a Caelesian princess named Myshtal as my fiancée.
I hadn’t really had a choice; becoming betrothed to Myshtal was the price of a ticket back home, but my significant other, Electra, hadn’t quite seen it that way. We’d tried to make it work, but eventually she’d broken up with me, although there was still a small sliver of hope for our relationship: in essence, if I could find a way to break things off with Myshtal, Electra and I could be a couple again. More to the point, I wanted us to be a couple again.
“Look,” I said, “I’m flattered, but…I think it’s too soon.”
“Too soon?” Vestibule repeated. “It’s been like a month since you and Electra broke up.”
A month, I thought, frowning. That didn’t seem right – it felt much longer. Almost without thinking about it, I began doing the math.
Immediately after Electra broke up with me, I’d gone with Rune – another member of the Alpha League – on an odd sojourn to deal with a pressing matter. Ultimately, we’d been gone about a week (although certain repercussions from that jaunt were still being felt). After that, I’d had about a week to hang out with my mother and grandparents before they left the planet. Following their departure, I had spent the last couple of weeks shuffling back and forth between home and various events on the West Coast. All in all, it appeared that it had been about a month since Electra called things off.
“On top of that,” Vestibule continued, interrupting my reverie, “word on the street is that Electra’s already moved on.”
“That’s not true,” I shot back. “A friend – a platonic friend – escorted her to a function. That’s it.”
“Okay,” Vestibule said. “I wasn’t trying to–”
She never got to finish her statement, as a gruff voice behind me suddenly interjected with, “Excuse me, but I believe you’re dancing with my date.”
The voice was plainly directed at me and was accompanied by emotions of jealousy, distress, and agitation. Spinning around, I found myself facing a giant.
It was another teen, but he was at least a head taller than me and seemed to be made of nothing but muscle that had been chiseled from solid rock – literally. I recognized him then; he was another member of the A-List Super’s teen affiliate – a fellow known as the Biolithic Colossus, whose body was made of living stone. Based on the scarf that was tied around his head and the eyepatch he sported, he appeared to be dressed as a pirate.
“I’m not your date,” Vestibule declared forcefully. “We broke up a while ago, Bee-Cee.”
“Yeah,” Bee-Cee agreed, “but we can still share a dance.”
“Pass,” Vestibule stated. “Why don’t you go dance with that little strumpet you cheated on me with?”
“Come on,” the stone giant said. “Just one little dance.”
He stretched out his arm as if to reach for her, and I instinctively stepped in front of him.
“She said ‘No,’” I stated.
The Biolithic Colossus looked me up and down, as if seeing me for the first time. “Look, I don’t know who you are, but I don’t want to make a scene.”
“Too late,” I asserted, waving a hand to encompass the rest of those present.
Glancing around, Bee-Cee finally seemed to notice that people were starting to stare – in particular, other couples on the dance floor, who were essentially standing still. They were all now watching what probably looked like a love triangle unfolding before their eyes.
He turned back to me. “Maybe I was being too subtle before. What I was trying to imply was that you should step aside, because I wouldn’t want to embarrass you.”
“That’s not likely,” I replied, staring him in the eye.
“Okay,” Bee-Cee muttered with a shrug, “but don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
He then reached for me. At the same time, Vestibule shouted “No!” and Bee-Cee disappeared.
There was stunned silence for a moment, and then people started cheering.
“That was awesome!” someone said.
“Way to go, Vestibule!” another person yelled.
“Woo-hoo!” crowed someone else.
There were similar comments for the next few minutes, which I initially found surprising. (Later I would learn that the Biolithic Colossus was a bit of a jerk, so his sudden absence wasn’t mourned.) In essence, Vestibule quickly found herself being thanked all around for ejecting a boorish lout from the party.
Not wanting to horn in on her spotlight, I surreptitiously took a step back while she was being congratulated, noticing for the first time that Smokey was standing about an arm’s length away. At some point while we had been engaged with the Colossus, he had sidled
